SEARCH RESULTS FOR: Emma Kirkby
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b. 1949 English soprano Kirkby was known early in her career primarily as a member of the early music group the Consort of Musicke and as a recitalist with the lutenist Anthony Rooley. She has subsequently performed music from all eras up to the time of Mozart and beyond. Her many recordings include Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, Handel’s Orlando, ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

(E-ma-el’ Shab-re-a’) 1841–94 French composer After hearing Wagner’s Tristan in Munich in 1879 with D’Indy and Duparc, Chabrier resigned his government post to become a full-time composer. The spectacular success of España (1883), a scintillating symphonic poem, proved him a master orchestrator. He composed two successful opéras comiques, L’étoile (‘The Star’, 1877) and Le roi malgré lui (‘King in ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

1841–94, French Chabrier’s father was determined that his son should enter the legal profession, even to the extent of moving the entire family to Paris in order that he could prepare for law school. In 1858, Chabrier entered law school and was soon employed in the Ministry of the Interior. His interest in music remained potent, however ...

Source: Definitive Opera Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

b. 1970 Swiss flautist Born in Geneva, he studied at the Paris Conservatoire and was appointed principal flute of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra at the age of 22, subsequently appearing as a soloist with major orchestras in the US, Europe and Japan. He has recorded all the instrument’s major solo and chamber repertoire and has premiered several new ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

(Hil-de-gart of Bin’-gen) 1098–1179 German Abbess and Composer Hildegard of Bingen was abbess of a convent at Rupertsberg near Bingen in Germany. When she was in her forties, Hildegard started to produce remarkable works of theology, science, healing, drama, history and music. She advised religious and secular rulers as well as undertaking preaching tours. She presented ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

b. 1959 English baritone Following a period with Scottish Opera (1988–94), he made his debuts at Glyndebourne and La Scala in 1995, and at the Metropolitan Opera in 1996. Much in demand in for the Mozart baritone roles (recording Don Giovanni for Abbado), he was also praised as Britten’s Billy Budd at Covent Garden (in 2000) and on record (under ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

1762–96 English composer Born in London of Italian and English parentage, Storace studied in Naples and first worked in Florence. He was back in London in the 1780s and spent time in Vienna, where his sister Nancy was a singer (she was the first Susanna in Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro); he was a friend of Mozart’s. Back in London ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

Although the terms ‘fortepiano’ and ‘pianoforte’ were used indiscriminately by musicians of the time, for the sake of clarity the former term is now specifically used to indicate keyboard instruments of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and the latter to mean the modern instrument. The piano displaced the harpsichord musically and socially, taking over the latter’s ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

Dancing is as old as time, and its one constant is music that you can do it to. And while not all music is designed for dancing, some revolutionary dance music has been produced since records began. Some of it is intentionally disposable, but it is surprising just how much of the dance music made in the last ...

Source: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Music, general editor Paul Du Noyer

Khovanshchina (‘The Khovansky Affair’), a dark opera, full of conspiracy, gloom and imminent violence, was based on a historical event. In 1682, the future modernizing tsar Peter the Great (1672–1725) was made co-ruler of Russia with his mentally retarded half-brother Ivan V (1666–96). At this time, introducing Greek and Latin practices into the Russian Church was ...

Source: Definitive Opera Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

As a schoolgirl, Adele had music constantly on the brain. She even persuaded her mother to make her a sequined eye patch to wear to school so she could channel pop star Gabrielle. Adele’s natural musicality saw her take up clarinet and guitar, but her ultimate devotion was reserved for vocals. She used to queue for hours to get ...

Source: Adele: Songbird, by Alice Hudson

1862–1918, French Debussy wrote only one opera that has entered the repertoire, but there were many other compositions without which this masterpiece among masterpieces may never have come into being. His lover, the singer Marie-Blanche Vasnier, some years his elder, had deepened his understanding of literature in his early twenties, and his interest in poetry ...

Source: Definitive Opera Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

1782–1871, French The French composer Daniel Auber made a favourable impression on his teacher, Luigi Cherubini (1760–1842) with his first opera, L’erreur du moment (‘The Mistake of the Moment’, 1805). However, he had to wait 15 years for popular appreciation until he established himself with two works: La bergère châtelaine (‘The Lady Shepherdess’, 1820) and Emma (1821). ...

Source: Definitive Opera Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

(Vocal group, 1988–96) Formed in 1988, Miki Berenyi (guitar, vocals) Emma Anderson (guitar, vocals) Chris Acland (drums) and Steve Rippon (bass) were a classic 4AD label band whose early EPs won cult success. With their ‘shoegazers’ reputation confirmed on two well-received albums – ‘loud guitars with much weaker vocals,’ said Anderson – the band scored hits ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock, general editor Michael Heatley

(Vocal group, 1993–2000, 2007–08) If Bikini Kill were one extreme of Grrrl Power then The Spice Girls were the most successful. With each girl adopting a defined image – Posh Spice (Victoria Adams), Scary Spice (Melanie Brown), Baby Spice (Emma Bunton), Sporty Spice (Melanie Chisholm) and Ginger Spice (Geri Halliwell, went solo 1998) – they were unstoppable after ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock, general editor Michael Heatley
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